Loving You Could Make Jesus Cry
by JellyCoco
Summary: Did you ever wonder what it would be like if Michelle started falling head over heels for Orla? No? Well, not to worry because I did anyway and I came up with this!
1. Chapter 1

_I just kinda wish you were gay _

It was one of the first Monday mornings of the year and as insufferable as Monday's can be, it seemed to be getting worse. The girls were hanging out on the bottom of some steps and Michelle was sure that Erin and Clare had finally gone mental. She wasn't sure when exactly it was that they started arguing about whether homework was "good for the mind" or some bullshit and honestly, she'd had enough of it. Sure, she had been tuning most of it out but Michelle had already spent a big chunk of the morning ignoring the James when he was going on and on about some Doctor Who (honestly, why should she care about his weird visit to the doctor's?) and she was also a bit hungover so she was already spent on having to ignore nonsense for the day.

"Seriously, are you two going to be done soon or should I just go ahead and start looking for another group of weirdos to hang out with?" Michelle looked at both of her self-righteous blonde-haired friends and raised one of her penciled-in eyebrows, challenging them to say something but Erin and Clare were never as quick-witted as Michelle so they simply shared a look and decided not to engage. "I didn't even know we had homework, Clare you're gonna let me copy yours later, yeah?" The smaller of the blondes was about to start preaching to Michelle about how copying homework isn't a very good idea when Orla suddenly appeared from down the hallway and everyone realized they hadn't seen the taller girl since they got off of the bus. Orla was eating from a small bag of some very salty looking chips and while also simultaneously holding a lollipop between her fingers just the way she holds cigarettes for her dear mam.

"Orla, you couldn't think to get me some as well?" pouted Erin.

"Aye, I did but I ran out of punts, Erin. I stuck all of them in at once and the vending machine only let me pick one thing, I think it's broken." Erin simply rolled her eyes, not wanting to tell her cousin that she was the one that broke the poor machine and now they will probably be snack-less for who knows how long. The rest of the group also took note of this and shared solemn looks between each other as the bell rang. They all stood up and decided to meet up at their usual spot come lunch time and took off to get to class.

* * *

The first half of their classes somehow seemed to draw out slower than Jenny's "informative" class meetings but now the girls (and boy) were headed to the cafeteria for lunch. Erin was going on about some girl that wore a denim jacket to school instead of her blazer and how that was Erin's idea "first", prompting Clare to add that it was actually "their" idea. Michelle on the other hand was wondering if downing a couple of shots this morning would've helped her drown these other two out. James was trying to talk to Orla about an assignment but she kept telling him to repeat his sentences, finding it hard to understand his weird accent.

"For the last time, Orla, my accent's not Indonesian!" Orla gave James a weird look and simply decided she'd try to decipher his weird dialect later. They were about to get to the cafeteria when they passed the vending machines which was surrounded by a crowd and it seemed to be getting bigger and angrier by the minute.

"How's a girl supposed to survive without chocolate all day, like!" The girls turned to whoever had said that and all simultaneously went wide eyed when they realized it was Big Mandy herself. They all shared a look and immediately turned around and started on their way into the cafeteria when-

"Oi! Didn't I see one of ya messing with it this morning?" The girls all stopped in their tracks. "You, with the curly hair, I saw you standing here this morning!" Orla turned around along with her group of friends and was about to speak when she was suddenly cut off by Michelle.

"Aye, it was James!" Every single person turned to look at Michelle and she internally cursed at herself and her poor impulse control. She pulled a very startled James so that he was standing beside her and slapped him on the shoulder. "Come on now, dickface, fess up!"

"It wasn't me! I don't even like any of that nasty stuff!" The wee English fella was about to have another emotional breakdown when Big Mandy spoke up.

"I was actually talking about the curly haired girl, not the uh, other curly haired girl," she said as she shot James an agitated look. Orla was again about to speak up when Michelle shoved Erin and gave her a rushed look.

"Orla's got high cholesterol so it couldn't have been her!" Erin finally spoke up having gained the courage to look Big Mandy in the eyes and... was she looking a bit more Schizo than usual? She found that all of the courage she had suddenly gained to defend her dear cousin was now fading and she looked at Michelle for some help. Michelle was too overcome with fear when Clare finally started blabbering. Seriously, that girl's anxiety can either be really unhelpful at times or seriously help them out of trouble every now and then. Which of either of these was about to happen? They can never tell.

"It wasn't any of us! We're all doing a fast for the starving African kids! We haven't had anything to eat in the past 15 hours and I can't really see any shapes right now to be frank so even if we did want to eat anything from the vending machine I'm not sure that we would even be able to see where it is so..." Clare realized she was talking at an inhuman speed so she stopped and looked around at everyone around her. Her friends had the usual looks of confusion and concern, while everyone else simply looked at her like she had just eaten an entire jar of peanut butter by herself (that's just a figure of speech, I promise).

"Jesus Clare, can you warn us next time you're about to have another cack attack?" Michelle scolded Clare and turned to Big Mandy once more, "look, before you go all King Kong on all of us, at least hear us out yeah?" Big Mandy was now stepping closer to the group rather menacingly but didn't say anything. She seemed to be waiting for someone to speak but everyone was too afraid to say anything except...

"Aye, the vending machine wasn't broken when I used it this morning, do you mind this morning, Erin?" Everything was quiet aside from a couple of "oohs" and a few gasps. Big Mandy pushed the girls aside to get closer to the tallest girl of the group who surprisingly was not too far off from her eye level, what with a school full of girls that are never more than half her size. Orla simply stared back unfazed until she suddenly realized she was in a bit of trouble.

"So it was you?" Orla had no chance to even think of a reply before someone in the crowd started shouting.

"Fight, fight!" The girls immediately reacted to this and finally broke out of their daze. Michelle grabbed Orla by the hand and pulled her back while Erin and the rest of them stood in front of her in a very protective manner that was anything but intimidating.

A very nervous Erin spoke up first, "So here's the thing, you can start knocking our heads together right now or we can figure this out. There's more than enough chocolate in the world to go around but I'm afraid there's only one Orla." Big Mandy didn't even think about this proposition (at least mull it over, seriously) and kept her gaze on Orla as she stepped forward to try to get to her when Michelle smacked her hand away. Clare turned to look at Michelle like she had just smacked Jesus Christ himself.

"Michelle! What did you just do?!"

Michelle's expression was currently one of anger and a little bit of fear (don't tell anyone), but Michelle is one of the few people who don't get intimidated by Finnoula so this shouldn't be much different, right? It's just a much bigger, taller Finnoula that doesn't smell like vinegar and grease. She quickly hyped herself up and took a deep breath.

"Look, I will bring you loads of chocolate every single morning until they fix the motherfuckin' machine, yeah? I'm talking tons, stacks of it. Just back off, go climb up your giant beanstalk and I'll bring the first stash tomorrow." Everyone held their breath. Big Mandy kept glaring at Michelle and then back to Orla and then the rest of the girls.

"Just as long as you keep your word then," and that was it. Big Mandy walked off, parting the dispersing crowd of catholic girls like the Red Sea, leaving the girls both astonished and relieved. They sat down at the steps of the nearest staircase and breathed a well-timed sigh of relief. Michelle was still pumping with adrenaline, she started wringing her fingers and her leg started tapping uncontrollably, the rest of the girls noticed this and shared a look.

"You know, I think you might've just earned yourself some serious street cred, standing up to Big Mandy and all that," Erin said playfully and nudged Michelle, who couldn't help but snort at Erin's horrible attempt to cheer her up. The tension was now gone and they all sat quietly, taking in the sound of the loud cafeteria and the very weird events that had just happened. A few minutes passed, and the very comfortable ambience was cut short.

"You know Michelle, I don't think you really needed to pledge to bring her 'stacks' of chocolate. You could've just offered to bring her one bar every single day," said James as he looked around at the girls, suddenly making Michelle aware of what could've been an avoidable inconvenience. She realized he was right, why did she even say that? "Stacks" of chocolate? She could've saved herself some serious cash. Michelle decided to not give this any more thought though, she just turned to him and gave him one of her usual scowls.

"Shut your hole, dickface."

* * *

It was finally Friday morning and the girls wandered around Pete's Wee Shop, looking around for their favorite candy and inspecting it to see if it was stale, which was unfortunately a routine they had learned to do over the years. Clare and James were marveling at some new container full of candy they had never seen before and wondered if they should really risk spending their money on some weird candy that might not even be worth it. Erin was already done picking her snacks for the morning and was following Orla around, who was still looking around even though she had her own baggie stuffed full of the weirdest combinations of candy that can't possibly taste good mixed together like that. Michelle on the other hand was waiting for her friends to hurry up and finish, she just gathered as much chocolate as she could afford for the day and wondered how much longer she would have to do this. She had asked Sister Michael to please make sure someone was onto fixing the vending machine but she's not sure the nun had even heard her, as she just waved Michelle off and proceeded to giggle at her copy of Stephen King's It.

The dark-haired girl wondered how many bottles of vodka she could've bought instead with all this wasted money, she was starting to come up with the theory that Big Mandy is so massive because of all the chocolate she probably consumes. There has to be some science behind that, she pondered. Her thoughts were interrupted as the girls made their way towards her, laughing about some silly thing the store owner had said to them. They made their way to the bus stop and went about their usual antics while they waited for the bus to show up. While Clare and Erin had suddenly started ranting about something school related, Orla startled Michelle out of her thoughts and tapped her on the shoulder. Observant honey-doused eyes peered into startled blue-green eyes, and Michelle wasn't sure if Orla had really giggled just now or if her mind had made that up somehow. The tall curly-haired girl seemed to be having a million thoughts rushing through her head, as usual, but none of them were coming out of her mouth. Michelle suddenly felt vulnerable somehow, and decided to break up whatever uh, whatever this was. She reached towards Orla and abruptly grabbed a handful of sweets out of her bag, shoving as many as she could into her mouth.

"Do you mind? I'm trying to eat something here." Michelle tried very hard to sound those words out but sadly they came out muffled and she was secretly trying not to choke right now, seriously how many different kinds of candy is this girl putting in that bag? Meanwhile, Orla had finally broken eye contact and looked down at her bag of sweets, reaching down and eating some herself while she looked around at nothing in particular. The dark-haired girl noticed how quickly the taller girl's aura had changed but decided not to think much of it since the girl is known for being so odd.

"I've been wanting to say thank you for saving me from Big Mandy and her massive gorilla hands, but I kept forgetting." Michelle snorted at Orla's phrasing, only to realize the tall girl wasn't laughing with her and was being completely serious.

"Oh I mean, yeah sure that's no bother. I honestly was just trying to stop her from going all 'hulk smash' on the entire school, Clare was shittin' herself as it was." Orla appeared to be analyzing Michelle once again and this time it was starting to irritate her, she couldn't figure out what the deal was. "Look, I'm not one to get sappy and neither are you so just move on, alright? You've said your thanks so just keep it moving, Curly." Orla furrowed her eyebrows at this, taken aback by the sudden hostility, but she remembered who she was talking to and shrugged it off. She reached into her blazer pocket and reached out to hand Michelle a bag stuffed full of candy. The shorter girl took it and looked up at Orla with a questioning look.

"I don't know what candy you fancy so I put a little bit of everything in there, I call it Unicorn Vomit." The taller girl fished around her pocket once more, this time pulling out a massive lollipop (seriously, how did that fit in there) and started unwrapping it as she walked off to line up as the bus rounded the corner. The dark haired girl frowned at the small paper bag, it was so full it was a small tear away from falling apart. James noticed his cousin had been quiet for a while now which was unusual for her and made his way towards her.

"How much longer do you think you'll have to keep this going?" Michelle was still staring intently at the bag of candy in her hand that James had gestured to, still distraught. The sound of her classmates being rowdy caused her to finally look up and she caught a glimpse of long golden-brown curls boarding the bus.

"I'm not sure."

* * *

A/N: This is my first attempt at writing fic so please be nice to me. Let me know what ya'll think! I plan on doing a series of one shots so feel free to give me any ideas if you have any!


	2. Chapter 2

_you're the one that i want_

* * *

"Jesus fuck Erin, how many times do I have to tell you, no one else is gonna be wearing a dress to the damn party!"

Michelle was starting to get frustrated so she stood up and headed over to Erin's bedroom window, looking for something more interesting to get distracted by. This was the third outfit the gang had been forced to sit down and give critiques on and they were all pretty tired of it. Not only was it weird, Erin also happens to take an eternity to change.

"Look Michelle, if you're afraid I'm going to outshine the rest of ya, you just have to say so." The girls couldn't help but scoff at this, while their friend was very beautiful, yes, they were also very aware that this party they were about to attend was at Jenny Joyce's house. Oh, and the theme also happened to be 'Grease.'

"No, I'm just worried you're gonna end up looking like a fuckin' cone is all it is," Michelle finished off with an exasperated sigh and finally gave up. She walked over to her bag and fished around for a bit before pulling out a small bottle of peach Smirnoff.

"Michelle, what on God's good Earth do you think you're doing?!"

"Calm your tits Clare, you'll give yourself a nosebleed. I'm just pre-gaming a bit, and blondie over there is already giving me a headache." The dark-haired girl then proceeded to take swigs straight from the bottle with experienced ease, she may as well have been drinking Coca-Cola. The girls, having known Michelle for years, had become so used to this that it was practically routine. The girls turned back to face Erin, well, just the sober ones, and were reminded of the dilemma at hand once again.

"You know Erin, maybe you should just stick to the theme, it'll look a bit funny if we show up together and you're the only one wearing a dress." James, being one of the more sensible ones of the group, tried to reason with Erin. He was hoping that maybe Erin was going to give this up soon, the party was going to start soon and he doesn't believe in being fashionably late. He had given the girls a very boring talk earlier about how 'a guest should never be late, as it is rude and irresponsible,' seriously what a dose...

"Not as funny as your hair," Orla's voice rose from the back of the room where she was sitting on the floor, inspecting a gel container almost the size of her head. Michelle almost choked on what one could only guess was her fifth shot by now and hurriedly reached for one of Erin's shirts that was lying around to wipe her chin with.

"I'm sticking to the theme Orla, that's why my hair is greased." James began explaining to Orla why his usually curly hair was now sleeked back Danny Zuko style, but he stopped once he realized she wasn't listening.

"She's right, it looks like a giant slug took a slimy shit on your head." Most of the girls groaned at the gross but expected gross comment from Michelle, except for Orla. The curly-haired girl's eyes were still fixated on the hair gel container but Michelle didn't miss the grin that slowly made itself home on Orla's lips. The room was now unusually quiet and Michelle realized she had been staring at her taller friend so she quickly took another drink of vodka and went back to staring out the window. Clare, on the other hand, had been running out of patience for a while now and she suddenly stood up from her seat on Erin's bed.

"I've had enough of this. Erin, you have to change. Look at us! We look amazing but we won't look as good if we show up without our Sandy!" Clare knew well enough that if you want Erin to do something for you, you have to flatter the shoes off of that girl. Everyone else noticed what Clare was doing and they went along with it.

"Aye, look at us, Erin, massive rides. You know you want to join in on this." Michelle gestured to the rest of the group (to herself mostly) and then struck one of her usual cocky poses. A smile slowly crept onto Erin's face and she finally gave in, she quickly left the room to change into something more appropriate for the occasion but not before making a cringe-inducing Grease related pun. The girls were now content with the new plan and they proceeded to check themselves out on Erin's bedroom mirror as they talked about who or what they might find at the party. Once Erin was ready, they grabbed their things and got ready to head downstairs and hitch a ride from Gerry to the party.

Michelle flicked at James' head as she passed him down the stairs, "By the way, pretty sure you were supposed to use actual grease on your hair, not a firm hold gel, dickface."

* * *

The sun was almost gone by the time they arrived at Jenny Joyce's "absolute monster of a house" according to Clare. The girls filed out of the car and practically ignored Gerry's sad attempt at giving them a curfew as they walked away, completely hypnotized by the house. They slowly walked up the pathway of the very big and beautiful lawn leading up to the house. There was colorful neon lights flooding out from inside the house and Jenny seemed to already have the Grease mega-mix going. There was fairy lights draped all over the lawn, on the lounge chairs and intertwined on the railings of the second floor. There was already small groups of teenagers hanging about, boys clad in leather jackets and denim jeans, and girls in pastel button ups and poofy skirts. The girls made their way up the entire pathway and were greeted by Jenny once they were in the house. There was a gigantic disco ball hanging from the ceiling in the main room, blasting sharp shards of bright light into the already neon lit room, and it was cleared of everything except for a lit up Saturday Night Fever-style dance floor that already seemed to be packed full of people dancing on it. Erin looked around at the huge crowds of people and was so relieved she didn't show up wearing some dull dress. She had decided to dress up as one of the Pink Ladies, to match with Michelle who was very adamant from the start that she had called dibs on her personal idol, Rizzo. Clare went with a more Sandy-inspired look, while James and Orla dressed up as members of the T-Birds. The wee English fella had tried to explain to Orla that he had called dibs on Danny Zuko but was quickly shut down by the tall girl who told him she just really looked amazing in leather and couldn't pass up the opportunity to show everyone up.

"You know, James, just because Orla wore leather pants doesn't mean that you had to as well, you could've just worn jeans," Clare couldn't stifle her laughter.

"Just realizing that now, thanks Clare."

The girls headed to the snack room to grab themselves some drinks, and Orla's chocolate brown orbs immediately landed on a huge cotton candy machine in the middle of the room. She slowly shuffled her combat boots towards it, so very cautiously, almost as if the cotton candy machine would get startled and run off if she made any sort of sudden movement. The girls gave her the usual concerned look and proceeded to walk around looking for snacks and drinks they might like. Clare and James were fixated on a gigantic fruit punch fountain, they stared at it with looks of astonishment and a little bit of fear. Erin and Michelle made a few rounds of the room and ended up getting distracted by a humongous ice sculpture of the car from 'Greased Lightning.' Who asks for that but most importantly, who pays for that sort of thing? Surely, money was no object for Jenny and her family so the girls shrugged it off and walked towards some other tables. While they started picking out some snacks, Michelle couldn't help but roll her eyes once Erin started moping about how David hadn't shown up to the party. The dark-haired girl realized Erin wasn't going to give it up anytime soon, so she grabbed a seat for Erin and herself and began to eat some of her snacks while she pretended to be listening to her slightly self-absorbed friend. A few minutes later she was chewing on a piece of some very fancy chocolate as she scanned the room when she caught a glimpse of Orla by herself at the cotton candy machine. The curly-haired girl now had strands of pastel pink and baby blue cotton candy strung about on her Spice Girls-inspired buns, all over her arms and tangled all around her hands but she somehow kept going for more. A small strain of pink cotton candy that was on her head fell down onto her forehead and Orla looked up at it with a frown. Michelle couldn't fight the smile caused by the taller girl's facial expression.

"Oh I'm sorry, I didn't think my non-existent love life was so entertaining to you!" Michelle snapped her eyes back to Erin and was immediately annoyed again.

"Ach, my bad, Erin. You're right, it's not entertaining. Actually, if you hadn't noticed, your boring fuckin' stories are putting me to sleep. I need a drink."

Michelle grabbed her bag and headed over to a dimly lit corner of the room, and once she was sure Jenny wouldn't catch her, she retrieved her vodka bottle out of her bag and took a few drinks. The alcohol hadn't been making its effect as fast as Michelle wanted it to so she decided to down the bottle instead and threw the now empty bottle back into her bag. She felt a slight burn but quickly cleared her throat and shook it off. The music had gotten louder in the main room, and she could hear different sorts of conversations going on around her. The fairy lights in the snack room were slowly getting shinier and blurry and Michelle's face was now slightly blushed. She looked around the room and saw her friends had regrouped and were sitting around a small table, laughing their hearts out. A fourth person was missing and a slightly dizzy Michelle furrowed her eyebrows as she looked around the room again, and she found Orla still standing at the cotton candy machine, except someone else was standing next to her this time. Michelle squinted to try to get a better view of who it was and all she could see in the dimly lit room was that it was some random guy, and he was standing a little too close to Orla. The dark-haired girl felt another slight burn but it wasn't in her throat this time, it was in her chest. She kept glaring across the room, trying to figure out why she suddenly cared that this random guy was smiling as he spoke to Orla, and why Michelle's breathing got heavier when he pulled a strand of cotton candy away from Orla's hair.

"The fuck?" Before she knew it, Michelle was making her way around the tables and chairs scattered around room, speeding up her pace as she got closer to her target. She stumbled around a little and kicked a chair away from her when it almost tripped her, causing the few people in the room to look over at Michelle. "What's all this? Orla's who's your new friend here?" Erin stood up from her table across the room, recognizing the way Michelle raised her voice and the tone that came with it. Orla kept her gaze on the inebriated girl in front of her, wondering what she was playing at and how she got so drunk so fast.

"His name's Charlie, he goes to church with us sometimes."

"Oh, an altar boy? That's fuckin' class isn't it? What brings you here then, Charlie? Huge fuckin' fan of cotton candy, are ya?" Michelle took a step closer to the slightly intimidated boy, and although her voice was laced in it's usual playful tone, her eyes were staring daggers into his eyes. Michelle was about to speak again when Erin finally got to her and grabbed her by the shoulder.

"Maybe we should go outside for a bit, yeah? We were all about to go get some fresh air, come with us, Michelle." Erin knew better than to try to argue with her best friend when she was drunk and fired up, she had come to learn over time to take a more gentle approach at trying to calm her down. A few seconds passed by with no response from anyone, Erin held Michelle by the arm as she looked back at Clare and James still sitting at the table, giving them a look telling them she had it under control and for them to start heading out. Meanwhile, Michelle and Orla had been staring at each other for a while now, and when Erin looked back at them, they seemed to having an entire conversation with just their eyes. No one was sure what to say, until Charlie finally spoke up.

"I'm gonna head out." Erin was the only one to acknowledge him and nodded at him as he started to walk off. The blonde started rubbing Michelle's back, feeling the soft satin of her friend's pink jacket run along her fingers.

"Clare and James are bound to start freaking out soon, you know those two aren't much for being left alone at parties." The dark-haired girl finally looked over at Erin, and the blonde noticed the hesitation in the brunette's face. "We'll meet up with you guys in a bit." That seemed to be enough and Michelle was off. Erin watched her leave through the sliding doors leading to the front lawn and she turned her attention to Orla.

"All that cotton candy, you're gonna make yourself boke." Erin's attempt to make her cousin laugh went unnoticed and suddenly, Orla was walking away from the blonde. "Woah alright, I was just joking around, where are you going?" She followed Orla into the main room and pushed through crowds of people, almost losing sight of her until she saw her making her way up the stairs so Erin quickened her pace and followed Orla into a room on the second floor. She found her cousin standing on the balcony, leaning against the railing and looking up at the sky. The silver moon was hidden behind some clouds, the rest of the sky was dark with shades of indigo and sprinkled with stars, some of them very bright and beautiful and others slightly dull and dim but they were stunning all the same. Erin joined in, deciding not to disturb the silence. The music was still playing, laughter would swivel its way towards them every now and then from the small crowds of teens below, and both girls found the cool night air a bit calming. The party inside the house was loud and hectic while everything outside was quiet and serene, and Orla found herself feeling the same.

"She does that a lot." Orla's soft voice broke the silence and Erin looked over at her cousin, confused by what she had just said. She followed the taller girl's gaze down onto the front lawn below them and to their group of friends, and she was looking at Michelle.

"Aye, she does." Erin has spent the better part of her life figuring her cousin out and deciphering her odd way of saying things, so she came to the conclusion that the curly-haired girl was referring to Michelle's heavy drinking habits. The blonde kept her gaze on Orla and waited for her to finish her thought, but the girl didn't say anything else. She didn't follow up with any other sort of comment or observation, she just kept looking at Michelle. Erin wondered what it was that Orla was so fixated on, but she knew better than to overthink anything her cousin does, so she shrugged it off and went back to observing her friends. The group was sitting down on the grass, and Clare and James seemed to be deep into some sort of argument. Whatever it was about, it must've been funny because Michelle, being as shitfaced as she was, was doubled over holding her stomach and laughing so hard that she ended up splayed out on the grass. "We oughta head down there before she gives herself a nosebleed."

* * *

"What's all this about?" Erin asked and waited for practically anyone to answer as she sat down on the grass next to Michelle who was still lying on her back and staring up at the sky, giggling like an idiot. The blonde turned to Clare and noticed she was trying very hard not to laugh.

"It's just," and she was cut off by Michelle as she started laughing her head off again, causing Clare to join in. Erin gave both of the girls funny looks and wondered if Michelle had finally bullied Clare into drinking some of her vodka this time. James was the only one not laughing and was actually looking a little solemn.

"I tripped and dropped my entire slice of cake into the water fountain."

"I'm sorry James but that's actually quite funny." The group burst into huge bouts of laughter and it eventually subsided into a comfortable silence. They all sat amongst each other, playing with grass, singing off-key and finger drumming along to whatever song was playing inside the house. Michelle was still lying down, her head was turned to its side as she stared at something in the distance. Orla was across the lawn as she had decided to wander around earlier rather than rejoin the group when Erin did. She was inquisitively staring at a massive bush of Azaleas, slowly circling around them and carefully caressing a petal every now and then. Michelle's vision was far gone by now, the bright red azaleas were basically glowing and the fairy lights were blinding. Everything was a blurry, colorful mess except for the one thing she never lost focus of, and almost as if she'd sensed her staring, Orla's eyes darted to look up at Michelle lying down across the lawn. The dark-haired girl could've sworn someone had punched her in the chest just then, she felt as if some giant asshole of an elephant had made itself at home and sat down on her lungs. Her eyes instinctively shut so tight she started seeing stars and that's when she heard a familiar voice.

"Are you okay?" Michelle opened her eyes the slightest bit to find Orla standing above her, beautiful brown eyes wide with concern. The bright and hazy stars Michelle had been seeing were now floating all around Orla, there was an Azalea placed behind the curly-haired girl's ear which was glowing brighter than the sun, and the tall girl was now peering down at the weird faces Michelle was making

"Gonna need a minute," was the only thing Michelle could strain out. James patted the grass next to him and Orla swiftly joined him in the circle. The group quickly started up conversation and were now laughing at some silly thing that had happened earlier involving some clumsy girl and a huge bowl of chips. Michelle felt everything spinning around her, she closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths, hoping it would stop her from throwing up when a tug at one of her boots caused her to sit up on her elbows. Across from her sat Orla, looking down at Michelle's black leather boot as she carefully tied the undone shoe laces. The dark-haired girl held a perplexed look on her face until big brown orbs moved to look up at her. Michelle let out a groan and threw herself back onto the grass.

Time quickly slipped into the late hours of the night and the breeze was now a few degrees colder. The girls were some of the few people left on the lawn as the rest of the teenagers had gone inside to escape the cold.

"How much longer do you think they'll keep blasting that Grease Megamix, it's doing my head in."

"What doesn't do your head in, Clare?"

"There's actually quite a lot, Michelle, like you know, music that hasn't been playing on repeat for the past 3 hours and such." Erin sensed there was going to be a lot more banter coming in so she put a stop to it before Michelle could answer with some clever yet rude remark about Clare.

"We should start heading home, I told my Ma we'd be home before midnight." Everyone started getting up and gathering their things, except for Michelle who was struggling to get up, she was swaying on all fours and holding onto the grass for dear life. Erin was aware of the kind of treatment her rebellious friend gets from her Ma when she goes home drunk so came up with an idea and walked over to her friend to help her up. "You're sleeping over at my house tonight."

"Wha- well, can I come with?" Michelle was now leaning on Erin (a little more than she actually needed to) for support but that didn't stop her from roughly shoving James by the shoulder.

"For fuck's sake, James can you stop being clingy for five fuckin' seconds?" Clare realized she was now the only one left out of this last minute sleepover and she also wasn't much for being alone in the dark, not that she was afraid of it, you know, she just doesn't fancy it is all.

"Well, if you're all going then so am I! Absolutely no way I'm walking home alone at this hour." Both Erin and Michelle simultaneously rolled their eyes and started on their walk home followed by their small group of very impressionable friends.

"Bunch of pussies."

* * *

"Michelle you're gonna need to stop dragging your feet and stop stepping on my foot or I'm letting you walk the rest of the way on your own." The dark-haired girl chuckled at this and took a swig of a small miniature bottle of vodka. "Jesus Christ, are you seriously still drinking?"

"Oh relax, will you? Look, I've already finished it."

"Alright, nope. I'm not doing this, have fun tripping over yourself all the way home," and with that, she took Michelle's arm off of her and walked ahead to keep up with Clare and James who were starting to leave them behind.

"Suit yourself then! I can walk on my own and I definitely don't need you-," Michelle was unable to finish her sentence as she was abruptly cut short by a street curb that had gone unnoticed by the girl until now that she had made contact with it. "Fuck me, I'm lucky I've got such a nice ass otherwise that would've hurt a lot worse, and since when has this shit been here anyway?!" Michelle kept blabbering to herself about how stupid street curbs are and how "unsafe" they actually are as she made the effort to get up and keep walking when she was suddenly lifted off of the ground.

"I think that the curb's been there for at least a couple of weeks now but I can't be too sure." Michelle quickly realized that her taller friend was carrying her bridal-style, completely unfazed.

"What are you on about, Orla? Put me down now!"

"You'll get left behind if I do and I'm pretty sure a bridge troll lives around these parts and I'm the worst at solving riddles."

"There's no bridge around here, Orla, you're mental. Not only that but trolls don't fuckin' exist, now put me down." The shorter girl tried to pry herself free to no avail. "Mother of God, when did you get so damn strong?"

"My step aerobics instructor says we need to rebuild the core from the ground up so I've been doing a lot of push-ups in Aunt Mary's garden."

"Why not just do them inside your house?"

"Because there's no soil inside my house, silly." Michelle was left with more questions than answers but she decided to leave it at that. She looked ahead to see they were trailing behind the rest of her friends who were collectively kicking a rock down the sidewalk, meanwhile Orla kept her eyes on the sidewalk and seemed to be concentrating on not tripping. Michelle had never physically been this close to Orla, and she found herself staring at the taller girl's features. The way her observant eyes would glow every time they passed a street light, her perfectly chiseled cheekbones, the freckles peppered on her face, and finally her rosy lips. It suddenly felt like she had been staring for an eternity, and the shorter girl felt frustration and an agonizing sadness all at once, a very new feeling she was starting to get tired of.

"You smell like peaches," the taller girl scrunched her nose, "and hand sanitizer." Michelle was startled out of her daze and quickly diverted her gaze away from Orla.

"It's the vodka, sorry."

"Oh it's no bother, I like it." Michelle laughed at this, it was a weird thing to say, even for Orla. A few minutes passed and the shorter girl suddenly felt the other girl's breath on her neck. Confused, she looked up to find smoldering brown eyes intently looking at her... lips?

"What are-"

"Oi! We're locking the both of you out if you don't hurry it up!" Both of the girls looked up, startled by Erin's yelling and realized their group of friends were nowhere to be seen and were now around the corner heading down towards Erin's house. Neither of them noticed when it was exactly that Orla had stopped walking or how long they had been standing under a streetlight just staring at each other like something off of a dumb and cheesy rom-com Erin and James would probably cry to. Both girls cleared their throat and Orla proceeded to catch up with the rest of the group while Michelle kept looking ahead of them and tried to hide the very prominent blush on her face from the girl currently carrying her. They quickly arrived at Erin's house with Orla not even breaking a sweat and Michelle wondered how extensive this girl's workout really is. The taller girl made her way up the path on the front lawn of her cousin's house and gently put Michelle down at the front door, she put her hand on the door handle to open it and go join the others inside when she suddenly stopped with a bemused look on her face.

"Oh, right," and before Michelle could question what was happening, soft lips carefully met with her cheek in a chaste kiss. Michelle was stunned to say the least and both girls stared at each other as smiles slowly grew on their faces and they each exhaled breaths they had been holding in. Michelle wondered if she should return the favor and was in the process of leaning in when...

"Are both of you done yet? I'm going downstairs to lock the door soon and I'm not letting you in if you're still out there." Both girls looked up to find Erin looking down at them from the second-story window.

"We'll be right in, cock block!"

"Actually, in this case the correct term would be 'Twat Swat', thank you very much!" Erin finished her sentence off with an aggressive shut of her window as Michelle flipped her off. Orla offered her hand for Michelle to take and they shared a look before making their way into the house.

* * *

The next morning, Michelle was awakened by some extremely bright rays of sunlight making their way in through Erin's improperly shut bedroom curtains. Sure, she was used to being the first one to wake up most of the time but she was really planning on sleeping through most of her hangover. She groggily got up from her sleeping spot on the floor and clumsily tried to weave her way through her other friends who were still asleep on the floor. It was mostly a success, except she did trip and step on James' hand but he was asleep and he didn't feel it therefore it doesn't count. Michelle shut the curtains and once the room was dim enough, she decided she could go back to sleep, but right as soon as she was going to make her way back to her spot, she noticed something was off. Erin was the only one sleeping on her bed, Orla wasn't with her as usual and Michelle quickly scanned the rest of the room trying to find some trace of the girl to no avail. She came to the conclusion that Orla had probably headed over to her mom's earlier and it made her chest hurt a little and not in the good way, like when Orla stares at her like she knows all the secrets of the world and is waiting for Michelle to say them to her. Michelle realized she wouldn't be able to go back to sleep so she quietly made her way downstairs and found Granda Joe in the kitchen making a whole breakfast buffet as usual.

"Mornin' love, why don't you have a seat and help yourself."

"Right I will, can't resist your cooking. Shit's better than my Ma's but don't tell her I said that, alright?" The older man chuckled at the girl's foul language as he poured her a glass of orange juice.

"Scout's honor."

"Also, would you happen to know where Orla went? Couldn't find her upstairs."

"Aye, she took off earlier to her step aerobics class. She should be back by two." Michelle couldn't help the smile that crept onto her face, she wasn't sure what she was afraid would happen but she was a bit relieved now. She made her way to her usual seat at the table and her heart almost gave out when she found the red azalea Orla wore last night neatly placed on the table. "Did you have something to say to her, love?"

"I do."


	3. Chapter 3

p class="p1" style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; color: #454545; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"span class="s1" style="font-family: '.SFUIText'; font-size: 17pt;"Okay so I'm sorry to just drop this onto you guys, I know it's probably really inconvenient but I have been posting my story first on AO3 and then onto here but lately I've been busy and honestly it's so hard updating the story on here. It's so much harder and I have to work around the weird way that things are done here so I will be just updating the story strictly on AO3 from now on. I want to make sure my content is as good as it can be for you guys and I can really, truly do that on AO3. /span/p  
p class="p2" style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; color: #454545; min-height: 20.3px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;" /p  
p class="p1" style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; color: #454545; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"span class="s1" style="font-family: '.SFUIText'; font-size: 17pt;"Chapter 3 is up on AO3 if you would like to continue reading it through there. I'm sorry for the inconvenience and I thank you so much for reading my work. Hopefully I will see you over on the other site as I update the story. I have many more ideas for more one shots and even a sequel so I will be continuing it for sure. Thank you again. -A/span/p 


End file.
